Truth
by OakeX
Summary: A series of vignettes featuring Anthony and Johanna in post-turpin-todd-lovett-odd settings. Or at least, hopefully it'll develop into that.
1. Chapter 1

**Hi. I'm OakeX, and this is my first time writing for Sweeney Todd (not for this site, but just specifically for this fandom). I kind of wrote this out of compulsion, because I was having a bit of a breakdown when I realised that I had just invested a lot of time and effort caring for characters who aren't even real, so to continue the illusion of reality I delved into the depths of ST fanfiction.**

 **I wrote this to the best of my abilities (although fluff isn't really what I'm good at), so this shouldn't be _too_ bad, but I'm always open to criticisms or suggestions, or even just a review saying hi. I know my dialogue's a bit shaky, so if anyone's got tips, I'd be glad to hear them.  
Being a narcissistic human, if you say compliments and adorn your reviews with nice flattering things, I wouldn't mind that either.**

 **This won't be a oneshot cause it'll continue on, but it won't really be a multichaptered story cause there won't be any overarching plot lines. It'll be more like a series of vignettes, slice-of-lifey kind of stuff.**

 **I don't know whether I wrote these characters in-character or not. They _feel_ in-character to me, but I'm not a great judge on this kind of thing.**

* * *

It's at night (of course it is, isn't that when all soft tender moments happen) that she touches him on the cheek and looks pointedly at him. He glances over at her and smiles, and then goes back to reading his book (well, 'reading', he doesn't really know how to read books even if he can read maps). She shakes her head a little and leans into his shoulder, and he bends his neck a little because he likes the feeling of her hair on his neck, and she reads with him (well, 'reading', she can't really read either, because Turpin had associated literacy with mobility, and mobility with freedom).

Together, they open their mouths and articulate slow hesitant sounds, like children, curving their lips over the shape of those funny symbols written in neat lines across the page. After a couple minutes of faltering steps, they make it to the end of the sentence.

Anthony kisses her on the cheek. "I think we're doing quite well."

She laughs. "You always do."

"I'm the expert. I would know." He picks up a sheet with twenty-six funny symbols on it, and waves it gently. "After all, I know how to make these sounds, and you don't."

"They're on your maps. It's biased on your part."

"Think what you like. But I say we're getting better." And he covers her hand with his, like a bear paw over a bird wing, with his coarse skin (which he hates), and her unworked hands (which she hates).

And she wonders what it would be like to work on a boat all day, smelling salt air and living on land which is open to the skies. She doesn't envy him, no she fears the outside world, and on a ship in the middle of the sea one must work and talk and fight with others, but she wonders.

And he wonders what it would be like to be locked away in some mansion with a demon for a father, and he shudders at how his princess had swapped her tower for a madhouse, and he squeezes her fingers a little, but he wishes his hands could be smoother for her, like the gentleman he wants to be for her, because she's had enough of dull ragged edges for one lifetime.

She doesn't seem to mind though. She runs a hand along his shoulders, and the tension he seems to always carry along with him relaxes a little, and she lets out a breath that she didn't know she had been holding.

"You're always so stressed."

He twists his lips into a smile, broken out of his reverie. "Don't be silly, of course I'm not."

Johanna looks at him in the face, and knows he's lying. Of course he is, she can see it clear as the stars outside, because he's got a thousand tells (and no, before you ask, one of them is not his eyes —this may be a romance fanfiction but it's not _that_ cliche— because eyes are just ocular organs, not the windows into the soul that Shakespeare loved to paint them as), like the twitch in his jaw, and the way his eyelids flicker. She's only known her husband for the better part of a year, but looking outside a window for your whole life (minus three days) will grant you some fairly keen observational skills.

But she'll let him off for now. He wants to try and play the hero who saved the princess, and she's content to let him be. She doesn't answer him, just kisses him quickly, and touches his shoulders again, feeling his muscles loosen more and more (Turpin was always tired after a hard day bullying vagrants, and would often solicit her massaging services). As he finally begins to relax, she feels the nervous energy lingering inside her begin to dissipate.

Perhaps her husband's a little foolish, to stress about her and then never tell her. But she can't deny the fact that she does the same, and if she's so concerned about his worrying, it's partially because she can't relax until he does.

He rustles the book again, and clears his throat. She closes her eyes and smiles, listening to him slowly and gently fracture the english language.

After all, she can't do much better.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading. It's short, I know, and cliche, but hopefully I'll get more chapters out later.**

 **I probably won't write anything really dark and heavy until much later; for now it's just light, easy fluff, as I come to grips with ST.**

 **Cheers for taking the time to read this.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Oh my god I completely forgot about this.**

 **I was originally intending to update this roughly once a fortnight, but then I was also intending to just write when I felt like it and inspiration genuinely came, so I guess it isn't too surprising that I ignored this for a month.**

* * *

It's strange to her, lying in bed with him. It's not satin, it's not silk; it's not the bed she's used to (in fact, the sheets are quite cheap— coarse and thin and during summer they itch). But it's warm. 'Cause of him, she thinks. It's really warm, she doesn't understand how he can be so warm. He's lying on his side, curled up into her like a child, and his arms are draped loosely across her chest.

And that makes her wonder.

"Anthony?"

"Hmm?"

"Do you regret saving me?"

He looks at her with a confused look. "Of course not."

"Despite all the fear? The paranoia?" He moves his hands off her chest and sits up, and she doesn't like the cold, but it's needed. "People still hunt me down for the murder of Mr Todd. Everywhere I go, people are cold to me."

"The police know that boy Tobias did it."

"Not everyone believes him. Chatty old housewives, gossiping, having tea parties. They don't believe the police, and think they're all the smarter for it."

"Let them." He gathers her into his arms, moving to kiss her as he normally does. "We both know you didn't do anything."

"No, but do you regret it?" She pushes away from him, and looks him in the eye. "Saving me?"

"No."

"Be honest."

"I am."

"No, you're not. I can see you're not."

He looks at her. She's biting her lip, the little crease lines marring her pretty face. He sighs. "Is it obvious when I lie?"

"A little."

"Well then... yes. I do. But only sometimes," he hastens to add. "When it's dark, and I'm scared, and sometimes when I read the newspapers and they're writing sensationalist articles about Mr Todd's death." A shiver runs through his spine, and she rests her head on his shoulder. "Or when I'm at the docks and I see the boats... I wonder sometimes if it would've been simpler for me if I hadn't seen you that day."

"Singing to the birds?"

"Somewhat."

She smiles. "Thank you." And she kisses his cheek, because in a world full of lies, tainted by the sweat of venal young men, he, alone, is truthful to her. She's not educated, but she's smart, and even though sometimes it saddens her to hear the painful realities he holds inside him, she knows the only way she'll ever escape the bodies she saw that night — the only way she'll ever escape her former husband-to-be — is if she hardens herself with the truths of her world.

"What about you?" he asks gently.

"Never." This is her uncompromising truth. "No, if it weren't for you, I truly would have swallowed poison that Sunday night."

"Mm." His arms are warm around her, and she wonders if she'll ever understand how.

"Why do you stay then?"

"Because I must."

"Why must you?"

He buries his face into her hair, and inhales deeply. As he sighs, she smiles, and rests her slim fingers on his hips. "It's a cold night," he says.

"It's alright."

"Kiss me."

"Answer me."

"I love you."

"I love you too."

"And that's why."

"Why what?"

"Why I won't leave. Because sometimes I do want to leave, but it's just as dark and frightening on a boat at sea as it is on land at night. When I sleep, I see buildings on fire, and you're in the centre, and I see blood and razors and delicious meat pies. I eat the meat pies. I'll dream that I devour them, because I'm starving, and then I'll see that you're gone, and in your place are more meat pies, and I look at the meat pie that I've already half-eaten. I taste blood on my tongue. Then the dream ends, and I'll wake up shaking.

"I'll lean over and touch you, and touch your face, to make sure you're still with me, to make sure our escape wasn't all a dream. When I regret, I think about my dreams, and I think about how Mr Todd almost killed you that night, and I can't do it, I can't run away from that." He kisses her temple. "I'm scared. And I'm stressed. But you touch me and remind me of what's real, even if sometimes in the heat of terror I'll blame you for my fears."

She lets his words scratch over her. They are refreshing and raw, and she sees his eyes are wet. "Kiss me," she whispers.

The corner of his lips quirk up briefly for a second, and he obeys.

"You're a good man," she tells him, and takes his hand into hers "you're a good, good man."

"We shall grow old together."

"We shall."

"Away from your awful father and Mr Todd and the pie-maker and the boy. We'll live here in Spain."

"We shall."

"Do you want to?"

They kiss again, and her fingers twine into his hair. He pulls her closer, warm hands cupping her waist, and she smiles against his mouth. "I do, Anthony. Of course I do." In that moment, she no longer feels the rough fabric of the bedsheets, or the smell of mould in the roof. All she feels are his muscles tightening up in excitement, and all he smells is sweetness, and crescendoing in her ears swells the birdsong of freedom.

 _How is he so warm_ , she thinks.

And the hard truths of her husband penetrates her heart, and softens her.

* * *

 **It's been so long since I wrote proper romance with meaningful dialogue, and not dialogue which is just a bunch of awkwardly-connected jokes. This was fun to do, even if I was a bit rusty with the whole thing.**


End file.
